


Beam Up Whump

by GenuineSnoof



Category: Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Leonard "Bones" McCoy Needs a Hug, Poor Bones, Scotty is a good egg, Trauma, Whump no Plot
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-24
Updated: 2020-01-24
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:00:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22386079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GenuineSnoof/pseuds/GenuineSnoof
Summary: Three different takes on the same idea of "Bones is being beamed back up aboard after something horrible has happened to him on the away mission". Basically plot-less one-shots of Bones!whump.
Relationships: James T. Kirk & Leonard "Bones" McCoy & Spock
Comments: 31
Kudos: 130





	Beam Up Whump

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Antiel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Antiel/gifts).



“Have we got everybody, Mr Scott?” 

“Everybody but Dr McCoy,” Scotty replied, eyes never leaving the transporter scans. “The next gap in the magnetic field should appear over his position in about ten minutes, Captain.”

Jim Kirk’s frown was audible even through the intercom. “De la Cour, why wasn’t he with you?”

Marianne de la Cour, appointed leader of the away team, stepped forward to be closer to the intercom. “A medical emergency occurred at the camp. Dr McCoy was adamant he stay to treat the wounded Laxarian. I tried my best, sir, but-“

“Say no more, Lieutenant,” Jim sighed, though they could hear the smile in his voice. “No one blames you for not being able to convince the good doctor to leave a patient. You and the rest of the team report to Mr Spock right away.”

“Yes, Captain.”   
Scotty couldn’t hide his amusement at de la Cour actually saluting the intercom. “I’ll tell him you did that.”

De la Cour cast him a confused look, clearly at a loss what he meant, and headed for the door. “Mr Scott,” she said with a curt nod by way of saying goodbye.

She didn’t turn to make sure her two colleagues were following her, apparently trusting them to do so untold. As Ensign MacMillan passed Scotty, she leaned in quickly to whisper, “I recorded her trying to make McCoy come along with us. I’ll show you in exchange for a glass of the good stuff.” 

Scotty snorted. “You’re on, lassie.”

MacMillan winked and hurried after the others.

Scotty watched the doors slide shut and shook his head to himself. If he didn’t know better, he’d say that girl was flirting with him! Of course that couldn’t be – could it? Twenty years his junior and looking like that? 

He shook his head again. The transporter scan blinked a steady yellow. 

“Scotty?” Jim asked over the intercom.

“Not yet, Captain.”

“Let us know when you got him.”

“Aye, sir,” Scotty said. To himself he muttered, “C’mon, Len, move a bit. You’re worrying the Captain.”

At last, the scan beeped and Scotty proceeded to beam McCoy aboard.

When the transporter light took shape, it was to reveal a kneeling figure. Scotty hoped he hadn’t caught McCoy in the midst of some medical procedure, but of course with the planet’s tricky atmosphere, there would have been no way of communicating with the doctor to make sure he was ready for transport. They were already behind schedule, though, so McCoy should have been prepared to be beamed back. 

The light flickered off, the form manifesting entirely and Scotty thought, no, he must have caught McCoy in an altogether different moment. 

The doctor was kneeling with his hands behind his back. Even with his head bowed, shoulders tightly hunched up, Scotty could see his eyes were squeezed shut, his jaw clenched so much the muscles stood out. 

McCoy’s blue tunic was covered in purple paw prints – the injured Laxarian’s blood, Scotty thought – but there were also some lighter red smears on his sleeve. He seemed frozen, taking in small, quivery breaths and didn’t look up even when Scotty approached him.

“Leonard?”

McCoy didn’t react until Scotty put a hand on his shoulder, but then he jerked away in a full-body spasm, gasping loudly.

“Easy.” Scotty held on, squeezing his shoulder lightly. He could feel tremors starting to run through McCoy’s lean frame. “It’s Scott. You’re back on the Enterprise.”

McCoy didn’t seem to be able to catch his breath. He trembled in Scotty’s grip, bowing his head even more as if he was trying to curl up on himself. Now that he was close, Scotty could see McCoy’s hands were tied behind his back. 

“Len.” Scotty lowered himself to McCoy’s eye level and slid his hand to the doctor’s back, keeping a light touch on him. “Breathe. You’re safe.”

McCoy struggled to draw in a deep breath, letting it go forcefully slowly. He gave the tiniest nod with his head still bowed. His shaking only seemed to be getting worse, though.

Looking down McCoy’s back, Scotty spotted a long gash on his left shoulder where red gleamed through the ripped uniform. It wasn’t still bleeding, but looked painful enough. The bound hands were twitching as the doctor fought to control his breathing. 

“I’m going to untie you, all right?” Scotty tried his best to keep his voice calm and even. He wished he could just call medical already and let them take over, but even leaving McCoy to step over to the intercom was unthinkable. He looked like he would shake himself apart if Scotty were to take his hand off his shoulder. 

“You’re going to feel my hands on yours,” Scotty said before touching McCoy’s wrists, first aid training kicking in. “It’s just me, I won’t hurt you. It’s Scott,” he repeated, because McCoy still had to acknowledge his presence with anything other than the small nod earlier.

Carefully, he inspected the rough rope tied around McCoy’s wrists, damp with blood from where the doctor had obviously struggled like hell. 

“I’m going to get a knife to cut through this,” he said and lightly squeezed McCoy’s unhurt shoulder. “I’ll be right back. Can you hear me, Len?” he added, when once more no reply came. He was so out of his depth here, he really wished someone would just magically appear and help him out. Jim Kirk preferably. Hell, he’d even take Spock at this point. 

McCoy cleared his throat, a small, hoarse sound, and took another steadying breath. His whole body quivered with it. “Yeah,” he said, voice raspy. “It’s a’right, you’re doing great, Scotty.” 

Scotty was too perplexed to say anything and watched McCoy breathe a few more times – in through his nose, out through his mouth – before he finally lifted his head to look at him. There was a cut on his forehead, not long, but deep enough that blood had run down and dried on his face. His right eye was bruised and about to swell shut and there was blood smeared around his nose, probably from where he had wiped his sleeve over it. 

“Get a knife, I’m fine,” McCoy said and even tried to smile a little, though it ended up looking more like a grimace.

Scotty huffed a humourless snort. “Aye y’are. I’m calling medical.”

“No, no, that’s not-“

“Bridge to transporter room,” Jim Kirk’s voice came over the intercom. 

Scotty was on his feet in a flash. 

“Scotty,” McCoy called after him, “’s no need to-“

“Scott here, Captain.”

“You got him?” 

“Yes, Captain, but-“

“I’m fine, Jim!” McCoy called out, glaring at Scotty. He was trying to get to his feet, hands still bound, but didn’t seem to have shaken off the trembling just yet.

“… I’ll be right down,” Jim announced. “Kirk out.”

McCoy groaned. “Thanks for that,” he grumbled. “You gonna cut me loose before he arrives?”

Scotty frowned and grabbed a knife from the tool drawer. “What happened?” he asked, when he crouched down next to McCoy again and carefully cut through the rope.

McCoy flinched and accepted Scotty’s help in gently moving his arms in front of him. Part of the rope stuck to his chafed wrists. With a pissed off look, he tore it off – “Ow! Goddamn it!” – and flung it down to the floor.

“Help me up?” He held out his hand. “I’m not in the mood to face Jim on my knees.”

“Can you stand?” Scotty asked, taking the offered hand.

“Course I can fucking st-“ McCoy started and slumped against Scotty halfway up, when his knees buckled. 

Scotty gently lowered him to a sitting position on the pad. “How about facing the Captain sitting down?”

McCoy had his eyes closed again and took in deep, measured breaths.

“Leonard?” 

“This day,” McCoy muttered and leaned forward to hang his head between his knees. “Ugh.”

Scotty widened his eyes, suddenly worried for his transporter room as much as for the doctor, and looked around. “You need a bucket?”

“I need…” McCoy muttered, but Scotty didn’t catch the rest of it. He thought it sounded like ‘a new job’, but it might as well have been something else.

They stayed like that for a few more minutes, McCoy quietly shaking and breathing evenly with his head between his knees and Scotty carefully rubbing his back. Maybe, he thought, what the doctor needed was a hug, though he didn’t look like he’d accept one happily right now.

When the door opened, Jim Kirk hurried into the room, closely followed by Spock, and wasted no time in sitting down next to his huddled CMO and drawing him into a fierce embrace.

“Bones! What happened?” he asked, only letting go long enough to carefully lift McCoy’s head with a hand under his chin and wince at the damage. His gaze then fell on McCoy’s ruined uniform shirt.

“’s not my blood,” McCoy said. Scotty thought he still sounded nauseous and contemplated telling Kirk to move him a little less abruptly for all their sakes.

“This is,” Jim said, picking up McCoy’s right hand to look at his wrist. 

Spock, standing next to them, moved his head slightly, something having caught his eye. “You should let us accompany you to sickbay, Doctor.”

Jim frowned and leaned back to follow Spock’s gaze to the gash on McCoy’s back. “Jesus, Bones.”

McCoy glared at Spock. “It was my intention to have that treated, you know,” he said, sounding like a petulant teenager.

“Once he can stand,” Scotty said. He got an ‘et tu?!’-look from the doctor and shrugged apologetically.

Spock turned for the intercom.

“Stop right there,” McCoy snapped. “I don’t need medical swarming down here. Let me just catch my goddamn breath and I’ll be good to walk on my own, a’right? Christ.”   
Spock opened his mouth, but closed it when McCoy added, “I dare you. Next time it’s you, we’ll parade you through the ship on a gurney, too.”

Jim sighed. “Bo-“

“And you! Twice!”

“I wasn’t gonna say anything about that,” Jim smiled, squeezing McCoy’s shoulder. “Relax, deep breaths. We can wait.”

McCoy glared at him, sceptical, but nodded curtly. He scratched at a spot of dried blood near his bruised eye. 

Jim gently took his hand. “Don’t touch that. Just breathe.” He rubbed calming circles on McCoy’s upper back and looked aside at Scotty. “What happened?”

“I think he was in shock, sir,” Scotty replied.

McCoy huffed a breathy laugh, clumsily patting Scotty’s knee. “Shoulda been a doctor.” All eyes on him again, he sighed deeply and ran a shaking hand through his hair, making it stick up with dried blood Scotty only now saw was matted in there. 

“I’ll be fine, Jim. ‘s just been a bit… close this time,” McCoy finished darkly. A mighty shudder ran through him, as if he’d been doused with cold water. 

Jim tightened his half-embrace on him, arching his brows in concern when he felt McCoy unconsciously lean into it. 

The doctor swallowed audibly and cleared his throat.

Scotty looked around for a bucket again. 

“Turns out Laxarian prisoners aren’t meant to receive medical help,” McCoy said at last. He lowered his gaze, one arm sliding around his drawn up knees in a half-huddle. He swallowed again. “The guy we stumbled upon had apparently attempted to escape the camp. He’d fled in the middle of his execution.” He winced, shaking his head slightly. More at the thought of people still executing each other than at the particular memory, Scotty thought. 

“I thought he’d collapsed on his way to the infirmary…” McCoy shuddered again, curling up on himself even more. 

Jim stroked his arm. “You sent the others away.”

“Well, we were late for our meeting and I thought I was gonna patch him up, help him to the infirmary and catch up with them.” McCoy looked up to meet Jim’s gaze. “It’s not Marianne’s fault, Jim, really, she-“

“Never mind that now,” Jim said. “I know these things are always only just your fault.” He smiled.

McCoy snorted and nodded. “I alerted two of the guards when they walked by,” he continued. “I’d made sure the guy would survive his most recent injuries, but he still needed… Well. He wasn’t in a good place.” McCoy sniffed, reached up to wipe blood off his upper lip. “When they saw him… the guards shot him in the head.”

Jim winced. “I’m sorry, Bones.”

“Yeah.”

“I can imagine your reaction to that,” Scotty said and gestured vaguely for McCoy’s face.

“Yeah,” McCoy repeated and hung his head.

“Did they arrest you for aiding him?” Spock asked. He was still the only one standing.

McCoy didn’t look up. “You could say that,” he muttered. Jim felt him tremble against him. He exchanged a quick glance with Spock.

“Bones?”

McCoy clenched his jaw briefly, breathing in through the nose. When he spoke, he sounded almost apologetic, steadily staring at the floor. “They were gonna execute me.”

“Wha’ ?!” Scotty exclaimed. 

Jim’s hand tightened on McCoy’s arm. 

“They take helping prisoners very seriously.” McCoy kept looking at the floor, but he was clearly not seeing it, his voice having taken on an eerily calm, far-away tone as he was remembering the incident. 

“I told them I was Starfleet, they didn’t care, I told them to call the High Council, that they’d surely have something to say about murdering intergalactic allies… so they punched me in the head, but I didn’t go down just then… uhm… one of them shoved me… they got those claws, right?” He lifted his hand to gesture for his back.

“ So *then* I’m down… I kept telling them they’re making a mistake, but, uh… “ He lifted his brows, shook his head as if to himself. “I guess I said something earlier they couldn’t forgive.” He snorted, gazed up at Jim and sobered at the look of utter horror on the Captain’s face.

“Yeah, anyway, they tied me up, got me on my knees and then you beamed me up.” He turned his head to smile at Scotty who was staring at him with huge eyes. “Thanks, pal.”

Silence settled after that, thick as fog. McCoy tsk’d and tilted his head. “I know it can’t be, but I swear I heard the phaser go off right along with the transporter.”

“You’re right,” Spock said. “That is impossible.”

Gazing up at him through his lashes, McCoy muttered, “Yeah. Musta been in my head. Better that than the actual thing, though, ey?”

“Indeed,” Spock said.

McCoy smiled at him and swallowed, going very pale. “Uh oh,” he breathed and quickly lowered his head between his knees again. 

Jim slid his hand up to the back of McCoy’s neck, rubbing his thumb over the clammy skin. “Easy,” he said. 

“I know we have a bucket somewhere,” Scotty mumbled and stood to finally get it.

“I’ll be fine,” McCoy whispered through clenched teeth. “Gimme a sec.”

“Just breathe,” Jim said and stroked his back. “You got all the time in the world. You’re okay. You’re safe.” He looked up, surprised, when Spock sat down on the doctor’s other side Scotty had vacated. 

Gently, the Vulcan put one hand on McCoy’s arm and one flat against his forehead as if to help him keep his head steady.

McCoy breathed in shakily. “Sorry.”

“Apologising is illogical,” Spock said. “You are not responsible for your body’s reaction to trauma.”

Jim smiled at McCoy’s grumbled unintelligible reply. “Spock’s right,” he said, moving his hand to pet McCoy’s hair. “There’s no shame in being a little shaken after what you went through. I mean - when I think they had a phaser to your head… If we hadn’t been beamed you up just th-“

“Jim,” McCoy groaned at the same time Jim felt Spock’s even gaze – his Vulcan scowl – on him. “Can you not?”

“Oh sorry,” Jim hastened to say, grimacing. He squeezed McCoy’s neck lightly.

They sat quietly for a while; Scotty had left in search of that bucket. 

At last, Jim felt McCoy grow heaver against him. He bent his head to look at his face, when McCoy shifted a little and slurred, “Spock. I can tell what you’re doin’.”

“I am merely offering comfort, Doctor,” Spock said, ignoring Jim’s frown. 

“Comfort my ass,” McCoy mumbled. Jim could see that his eyes had fallen shut and he was slumping to his side more and more.

“I understand that isn’t a request,” Spock said, carefully withdrawing his hand from McCoy’s head. When there was no reply - only McCoy’s even, steady breaths - he moved his arm around the doctor’s shoulders to lift him off Jim’s side and with a swift motion, scooped him into his arms and stood up.

“Captain?”

Jim rose to his feet, not even trying to hide his grin. “He’ll hate you for that just as much as if we’d gotten him on a gurney.”

“I anticipated that,” Spock said. “However, he needs to go to sickbay and this way will be much quieter.”

“True.” Jim looked at McCoy, smile fading, and reached out to brush a stray lock out of the doctor’s forehead. “You did just put him to sleep, didn’t you?”

Spock lifted one brow. “Yes, Captain.”

Jim nodded. “He got really spooked this time.”

“Understandable.”

“Yeah, sure.” 

Spock waited till Jim’s eyes were on him aganin, before saying, “He will be all right, Jim. The doctor is very resilient.”

“That’s one word for it.” Jim sighed and led the way out of the room. “I should never have let him go by himself.”

“You didn’t.”

“You know what I mean, Spock.”

“I do,” Spock said. “We will make sure it will not happen again.”

“No matter how much he won’t like it,” Jim agreed. He picked up McCoy’s arm that’d fallen over Spock’s hand and gently placed it back on his chest.

“Indeed,” Spock said. 

Jim’s gaze snapped up to his first officer’s face at his tone of voice. “You’ll enjoy that, won’t you?” he asked, as they stopped in front of the turbolift.

“That would be illogical.”

Jim snorted. “Tell that to him.”

“I intend to, Captain,” Spock said, just as the doors opened.

THE END


End file.
